Become an investor in breakthrough hair cloning technology

We are excited to announce the development of the world’s first system that allows patients to ‘bank’ their hair follicles for future use. Both of our founding directors, Drs Nilofer and Bessam Farjo, are also medical directors of HairClone, which has developed the technology to cryopreserve intact human hair follicles.

At the moment, the most successful form of hair restoration is hair transplant surgery, but this does have limitations, as it can’t be used on a patient when they first begin to notice hair loss, or if someone is in an advanced stage of hair loss. This is because they will have a limited amount of donor hair left to use either now or in the future as hair loss progresses, and you cannot use anyone else’s hair. However, when hair rejuvenation and regeneration treatments via cell therapy are developed, donor hair limitation won’t be a concern, as the rejuvenation could be used when a patient first notices hair loss, and the regeneration treatment would regenerate as many hairs as required from scratch to create the patients’ desired look.

HairClone is now working on a system to allow the cells that govern hair growth, found within the hair follicle, to be multiplied in a laboratory. The goal of their first treatment is that if the patient begins to notice hair loss in the future, the patient could pay to have their own cells multiplied and injected back into their scalp, to replace lost cells and rejuvenate the thinning hair. HairClone is also looking into an even more ambitious system, as a second treatment, which looks to enable the regeneration of new hair shafts in bald areas of the scalp. Banking hairs as young as possible can be seen as an ‘insurance policy’ for those who have a family history of hair loss, preserving potential future donor hair of younger characteristics and vitality for either or both of these treatments.

The first step of the HairClone follicle banking process is a minor procedure to extract a small number of follicles via FUE, followed by a careful cryopreservation of around 100 hairs, which will then be kept at -150°c to “stop the clock”. Ideally, the follicles should be taken at the earliest age possible – as soon as a patient becomes aware that they may need hair restoration in the future. When needed, some of the follicles will be thawed and the living cells multiplied, which will then be implanted back into the scalp via micro-injections to rejuvenate miniaturising hairs.

It is unlikely to be a one-off fix – we expect that a patient will need to repeat the treatment at regular intervals, perhaps once every 3 years, to keep up with the progression of the balding process. However, all treatments will stem from the original banked follicles so only the one initial surgical extraction will be needed. In terms of cost, the banking service will be around £2,500, and the storage fee is expected to cost £100 per year. All HairClone profits will go straight to accelerating the research and development of further hair rejuvenation and regeneration treatments.

Pattern baldness affects 80 per cent of men and 50 per cent of women throughout their lifetime, and is typically a hereditary condition. Over the past few years there has been a sharp increase in the amount of people seeking hair transplant surgery, therefore we believe that cell-based treatments will be unique alternatives that will completely transform the hair restoration field.

It’s an exciting opportunity with the potential to completely revolutionise hair restoration. HairClone are currently crowdfunding the research, in partnership with Capital Cell. This will give people all over the world the opportunity to become a shareholder in HairClone and own a part of the business. The money raised will be used by HairClone to help fund and accelerate the development of their. With over £3 billion spent on hair transplant surgery alone globally, it’s a huge market that is only set to grow.